Life List

Life List.

100 things to do before I die

1. Live in Europe
2. Learn to properly fishtail french braid my daughter’s hair
3. Ride my horse bareback
4. Swim in bio-luminescence
5. Learn to surf. On a long board October 2010 Huntington Beach, California
6. Visit Hawaii. Stay in a hotel close enough to the ocean to hear the waves crash.
7. Make crescent dinner rolls that rival those of my mother
8. Have a dress custom made for me by a designer I love
9. Ride a bike across the Golden Gate Bridge
10. Publish articles for well known magazines
11. Write a book. A good one.
12. See aurora borealis from Alaska
13. Attend a World Cup soccer game
14. Go to fashion week. As a journalist/writer.
15. Spend time in Greece
16. Collect sea glass from 50 beaches
17. Attend the Tomatina food fight in Spain
18. Visit my husband’s childhood home in Warsaw, Poland  May 2011
19. Finish a sprint triathlon
20. Own a sports car
21. Take my kids to Poland while their Babcia + Dziadek are still alive    May 2011
22. Stay on a Caribbean island with my family
23. Swim in the Mediterranean sea
24. Commission a painting of my children from an artist I love
25. Own an original painting by Brian Kershisnik
26. Get a tattoo {sorry mom!}
27. Name an O.P.I. nail polish color
28. Have sex with my husband on a beach
29. Be in better shape at 40 than I am at 32
30. See both of my children married
31. Take a sleeper train across Europe
32. Become fluent in Spanish. Again.
33. Trace my husbands’ Eastern European genealogy
34. Visit my grandmother’s childhood town in Iowa
35. Ride a street car in San Francisco
36. Attend an honest-to-goodness movie premiere Cannes Film Festival May 2013
37. Roam around Paris for a few days June 2013
38. Earn enough money to sustain my family on my own
39. Read every book in my home library
40. Go behind-the-scenes at the Monterey Bay Aquarium July 2009
    
41. Have one massage a month for an entire year
42. Visit every one of the bridges my grandfather designed (working on it)
43. Stay in Martha’s Vineyard
44. Surf in Costa Rica
45. Visit Cape Cod
46. Own a pair of obscenely expensive shoes
47. Drive a race car around a track, un-throttled
48. Attend a Christmas Mass in Poland
49. Get one massage a month for an entire year
50. Travel to Australia
51. Meet David Sedaris
52. Take a first class sleeper train across Europe.  One of the fancy ones with a shower.
53. Go on a cruise
54. Sleep in a hut
55. Fly Virgin Atlantic and sleep in a horizontal bed while flying
56. Become a talented photographer
57. Spend an entire day at a spa, get every treatment available October 2010
58. Eat lunch at a European cafe May 2011
59. Be an instrument in raising awareness of, and finding a cure for Lupus
60. Renovate my kitchen
61. Travel to every state in America
62. See the ruins in Guatemala
63. Visit Spain, practice my Spanish while I’m there June 2013
64. Learn to hang glide Outer Banks, North Carolina, October 2013
65. Visit the rain-forest in Belize
66. See an elephant in the wilds of Africa
67. Graduate from college April 2004
    
68. Wear a ball gown (to an event of importance) Cannes Film Festival May 2013
69. Drive down PCH with my husband and kids
70. Sleep in a castle
71. Knit a sweater
72. Own a stock portfolio
73. Buy a house August 2000
    
74. Learn to hip hop dance. Properly. Not going to happen. Went to two Zumba classes + realized it’s not happening
75. Spend a day in a fashion house
76. Own a horse December 2009
77. Meet the Dixie Chicks
78. Sleep on a warm beach
79. Get 50 stamps on my passport (working on it)
80. Hear Cat Stevens perform live
81. Try Eastern medicine: acupuncture, etc.
82. Take an art class
83. Sleep naked
84. Marry my soul mate May 1998
    
85. Overcome my fear of open water {see #5}
86. Visit the Louvre
87. Understand math
88. Become a mother November 1999
    
89. Go running in Central Park
90. Follow a sewing pattern all the way through, make something I’d actually deem wearable
91. Go scuba diving in warm ocean water
92. Visit New England in the fall
93. Learn to play the piano
94. Dance at a European discotheque
95. Take professional makeup lessons at a M.A.C. store
96. Run through the alps
97. Canoe down the Amazon river
98. Have a conversation with Meg Cabot
99. Teach my children how to serve
100. Visit Stonehenge
101. See a flying fish {Catalina Island Summer 2009}
102. Feed a whole chicken to an alligator
103. Take a boat tour of Venice, Italy
104. Have an enormous, blow-out 40th birthday party
105. Scuba dive to the ruins of a sunken ship
106. Dye my hair Blond  The year 2009
107. Go whale watching in a kayak
108. R.V. across the United States with my kids
109. Hike through a jungle

Do you have a Life List? I’m not kidding, this one took me five days to come up with. I didn’t take it lightly, I really pondered things I want to get accomplished in this life of mine. There’s really something to writing something down, committing it to memory and promising yourself you’ll get it done. 100 things really affords you the indulgence of dreaming big.

Do it, do it now.